Tax Type
Retail Sales and Use Tax
Description
School yearbook purchases
Topic
Exemptions
Taxability of Persons and Transactions
Date Issued
05-10-1988
May 10, 1988
Re: Ruling Request/ Sales and Use Tax
Dear**************
This will reply to your letter of October 9, 1987 seeking a refund for sales tax paid in connection with student yearbook publishing costs incurred by********* (hereinafter, school), in 1987. This also has reference to documentation recently remitted to a member of my staff indicating the dollar amount of the refund requested by the school.
FACTS
According to your letter, the school's yearbook publishing costs are not usually met by the amount students pay for the yearbooks. Therefore, the school conducts fund-raising activities to make up the difference. Any excess fund-raising amounts left over at the end of one year, are applied to the next year's yearbook publishing costs.
Therefore, you ask whether the school may be entitled to a refund for sales tax paid on yearbook purchases in 1987 under the recently expanded exemption from the sales and use tax in §58.1-608.63 of the Virginia Code.
RULING
Effective July 1, 1987, but retroactive to July 1, 1986, §58.1-608.63 of the Virginia Code provides an exemption from the tax for "[t]angible personal property purchased for use, consumption, or sale at retail by an elementary or secondary school conducted not for profit..., for use in fund-raising activities, the net proceeds (gross receipts less direct expenses) of which are contributed directly to the school or used to purchase certified school equipment..."
Based on this expanded exemption, and the documentation recently remitted, I find basis for granting the refund requested by the school in this case. Accordingly, the department will issue a refund to the school under separate cover.
In order for its yearbook purchases to continue to qualify for this exemption, the school should maintain a certificate of exemption (Form ST-13), copy enclosed, on file with its yearbook publisher.
I hope that the foregoing has responded to your question, but please let me know if you have any further questions.
Sincerely,
W. H. Forst
Tax Commissioner
Rulings of the Tax Commissioner